


Today We Mourn, Tomorrow We Live

by thegrumblingirl



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet Ending, Elysium, F/M, Lethe's Water, Mutual Pining, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Not Canon Compliant, Past Character Death, The Fate of Atlantis DLC, can you smooch someone in a simulation? let's find out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-23 11:49:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20007829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegrumblingirl/pseuds/thegrumblingirl
Summary: Sparta would never cease to send out its children to die for the glory of her red shield, not until one day Sparta was no more.Brasidas had died for Sparta. For Kassandra.What if Brasidas was in Elysium from the beginning — and what if it was him searching for the waters of Lethe to bring an end to his torment?





	1. the souls that throng the flood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Basically, this is what happened: when Adonis told me about a Spartan warrior not under Persephone's control, I got more and more excited the whole way I was racing towards the objective marker. I hadn't spoiled myself for any of it yet, so I had true hope, which was promptly crushed by grandad lol. I know now that Brasidas is stuck in Hades, and I said to myself, No.
> 
> Add to that the Lethe's water quest and my firm belief that Brasidas was head over heels in love with Kassandra from the moment he met her, and this is what you get for your trouble.
> 
> This story is finished, and I'll post the remaining three chapters over the next few days. Please let me know what you think!

Elysium. Paradise by any other name — the realm of the dead, the gods, and Persephone’s revenge.

Beauty had only ever meant something to Kassandra in an abstract way: she recognised it when she saw it — what she felt was beautiful, anyway. She might not have always found the same things stunning or awe-inspiring what her fellow Spartans thought to be worthy of the word. But it was not merely the line of someone’s nose but the draw of their bow that made them a marvel in her eyes; not it could be the passion they dedicated to their cause in search of a better life, in search of good.

Beauty in Elysium — the beauty _of_ it — was as undeniable as it was a thin veneer covering dishonesty, empty promises, and deceit. In her need to control all she saw, Persephone had lost sight of what might have been her _task_ and, ultimately, a true act of resistance against Hades: putting the welfare of the souls under her guard first. Helping instead of caging them, allowing them to come to terms with their grief, their _deaths_. This was what almost everyone Kassandra had met in these rollings hills had been struggling with, in truth. They only wanted to leave because there was no peace for them to be found here.

Kassandra, in turn, had found her grandfather: a man she had never met, and who yet seemed to familiar to her as her own mirror image, reflected in the river Styx. But it was not Charon who had ferried her here — nor him, for this was but a simulation, as Aletheia had called it. A simulacrum, perhaps, was closest to Kassandra’s understanding. She still did not quite grasp how it was all supposed to work and what was expected of her, but she had to remind herself often that these were not true souls, they were… figments, guiding her on a winding path she had only the vaguest idea where it may lead. She doubted that anything she said or did truly made a difference in how any of this played out.

Truthfully, as she’d raced to meet this unnamed Spartan warrior Adonis had spoken so highly of, she had, only for a moment, hoped… but as soon as she’d stepped up to the house, and the man in Spartan colours sitting on a bench outside, gazing towards the never-setting sun, she’d known that this unnamed soldier was not the man she’d known, the man she’d last seen on the battlefield of Amphipolis. The man her own borother… her friend, who had died as he'd lived, in service of Sparta. For one, shining moment, perhaps even of her. He’d saved her, and it had cost him his life.

Brasidas.

How long since she had so much as uttered his name aloud?

She mentioned none of this to Leonidas, and as he challenged her to prove herself his heir, Kassandra did well not to think of herself and another Spartan general — not a King, though there was no doubt in her mind he would have been worthy of the burden — in the _agoge_ , demonstrating their skill to wide-eyed new recruits. Kassandra had never been fond of those training camps, but she had enjoyed her time there with Brasidas and his men. Sparta would never cease to send out its children to die for the glory of her red shield, not until one day Sparta was no more.

Brasidas had died for Sparta. For Kassandra, for her crusade against the Cult.

Sparta had barely deigned to give him a proper burial.

Kassandra kept those thoughts to herself, too. She dared not wonder — what would Leonidas have thought of Nikolaos’ decision to throw her off that mountain? Cult or no, would the prophesy have swayed him, too? Would Myrrine’s cries for mercy have held greater meaning to his heart?

Would she one day have to make the same decision?

“Kassandra!”

Leonidas’ call for her to keep up as they explored the valley below his homestead roused her from her sombre musings. She shook her head as if to chase the thoughts away like spiders in the dark, and quickened her steps to walk beside the Fallen King of Sparta. Her grandfather — if _mater_ could only see them now.

“Where did you go?” Leonidas asked plainly, and she was not so young anymore to playfully (or sullenly) pretend to misunderstand the question, as she would have very likely done with Markos.

“I did not expect to find you here,” said Kassandra, more out of a desire to be truthful and less to be mysterious; even though it might seem to be an evasive answer.

The look Leonidas was giving her now certainly suggested that was how he rated it.

“Out with it,” he commanded, and Kassandra silently cursed everyone who had ever told her she was ‘so much like her mother at her age.’ _Malakàs_.

“You being here has reminded me,” she explained, “of so many other I might meet. People I’ve known. People I’ve… who have fought by my side.”

Leonidas cut her another glance.

“You’re looking for someone.”

“I’m looking for more soldiers for Adonis’ rebellion,” Kassandra returned.

“You might not be looking with your eyes or with your spear,” said Leonidas, “but you are searching with your heart. It’s distracting you.”

With a sigh, Kassandra stopped walking and crossed her arms over her chest. “Grandfather, so help me Athena, I will leave you standing in this field, King of Sparta or no, and never return.”

She half expected him to be cross with her, but instead he laughed at her insolence.

“Just like your mother,” said the Fallen King and turned to move on ahead, leaving her to gesture somewhat rudely at his back. “So who?” he called over his shoulder.

This time, Kassandra took her time in falling into step with him, turning that thought over in her mind — or, rather, the question of what to tell him. He waited patiently. Eternity had certainly tempered his infamous impatience. She took a deep breath.

“His name was Brasidas. He was a general, a brave soldier. A good man. I would have liked—to say goodbye.” She had had to run off, after Kleon, after Deimos, to make them pay, with no time to mourn her friend before being thrown back into her own whirlwind of cruel history. When she had returned to look for him on the field, Brasidas’ body had already been carted off, and taken along the safest route to Sparta. She had never heard if he had made it home.

Beside her, it was Leonidas now who stopped, startling her. She turned, and the way he looked at her frightened her.

“Leonidas? What’s wrong? Do you know him? Do you know _of_ him?” _Oh Athena_ , Kassandra thought, _what has Hades done to him?_ Dread settled as a leaden weight in her chest.

“There is someone by that name,” answered Leonidas. “He is searching for something, something important, forbidden. A cure.”

“Is he sick? _Here_?”

Leonidas nodded.

“But I don’t understand,” Kassandra appealed to him for more than gestures. “This is Elysium, how can he be ill?”

“There are things that linger after death, Kassandra. Love, anger, even fear. But worst of all, is grief. Regret. Disappointed hopes.”

“What does that mean? What do you know about Brasidas, you must tell me.”

I only know that he is looking for something called Lethe’s water.”

 _Lethe’s water?_

“But why?”

“I think you ought to ask him that yourself.”

Kassandra suppressed a groan of frustration.

“Where can I find him?”

“Last I heard of him, he was headed to explore the region around Hypnos’s Path.” Leonidas flicked his gaze up towards there Ikaros was lazily circling above their heads. “You could send your eagle to scout ahead.”

Kassandra chewed her lip. She had a job to do… and Leonidas had already accused her of being preoccupied.

“I can find my way towards Rebel’s Peak,” Leonidas prompted her further. “Adonis is hardly subtle in naming things. It will be difficult to miss.”

She still felt doubtful, as was undoubtedly apparent on her face.

“Go on,” Leonidas said with a clap to her shoulder. “For what it’s worth,” he said then, “I think you should hurry.”

“Is he in danger?”

“Until you find him, and I have no doubt you will, he’s most of all a danger to himself. Go.”

This did nothing to allay Kassandra’s fears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tumblr: @screwtheprinceimtakingthehorse  
> twitter: @grumblewhale


	2. to whom, by fate, are other bodies ow'd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Having slowly lost all notion of time, Kassandra could not say how long, how many hours, it might have taken her to reach Hypnos’s Path. Taking a felucca across the stream, she found one there already. High above her, Ikaros cawed in warning: they were not alone. Quickly, Kassandra climbed up the first fallen pillar. She preferred to meet her adversaries head-on, she told herself, hoping it was only Isu guards she might find. Not the broken body of a friend._
> 
> Kassandra finds Brasidas. It is not a happy reunion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MY FEELINS PLS SEND HELP

Having slowly lost all notion of time, Kassandra could not say how long, how many hours, it might have taken her to reach Hypnos’s Path. Taking a _felucca_ across the stream, she found one there already. High above her, Ikaros cawed in warning: they were not alone. Quickly, Kassandra climbed up the first fallen pillar. She preferred to meet her adversaries head-on, she told herself, hoping it was only Isu guards she might find. Not the broken body of a friend. Peering over the ledge, overgrown with plants and moss, the last she saw of anyone were the unmistakeable leg greaves of a Spartan soldier, and then a splash of water. Shit.

Underground caves.

Fine, then.

She signalled for Ikaros to track her as best he could, heaved herself over the edge, and followed the spectre of who she _hoped_ was still her friend. She dove into the cavern, and as she continued swimming through the dark with naught but her senses to guide her, she considered how _badly_ Brasidas must want this cure if he were to go to such lengths to find it.

The tunnels went on forever, it seemed, and whenever she surfaced, Kassandra seemed to be one step behind Brasidas, as though trapped in a bizarre inversion of Orpheus and Eurydice. Finally, with one great push, Kassandra caught sight of him, just as he was about to enter a chamber that was filled with the hum of Hypnos’s obelisks. Her hackles rose as she sensed the presence of several guards in the rooms beyond. She had barely a moment — so she gambled.

“Brasidas,” she hissed. “Wait.”

He stilled, coming to a halt as though a statue — he would have made a fine Kolossi, some absent part of her mind supplied, all stillness and corded muscle, ready to spring into action at any moment but patient as the hunter. An unusual quality in a soldier, she had found, and a fine quality in a man.

“Brasidas,” she hissed again.

There was no doubt that he had heard her. Why wouldn’t he turn around?

“It’s me, Kassandra.”

“No.”

It _was_ his voice, undoubtedly his voice, and Kassandra would have wept for joy if not for how desolate he sounded.

“No tricks, Persephone. Please, not today.”

“Brasidas, I—”

“Intruders!” The cry of one of the Isu guards broke through her confusion and, for a moment, all fled from her mind but survival — hers and his.

She drew her weapon, and felt relief surge through her as she saw Brasidas do the same.

“Destroy the Kolossi, leave the guards alive!” she hollered over the din that suddenly filled the stone chamber. From the corner of her eye, she noticed Brasidas’ questioning look, but she trusted that he would follow her lead.

What followed was a fight to tooth and nail — the Kolossi were unlike any enemy Kassandra had fought before, and they demanded all her focus. At first, she and Brasidas fought apart, but rolling to avoid one of the Kolossis’ beam of energy put them back to back. With barely a second to spare to breathe, Kassandra looked over her shoulder.

“Like old times?”

He did not answer, but when he dropped down low behind her and raised his shield above his head, she had her answer. Turning, she vaulted, and propelled by the might of his arm, she flew at the guards coming to attack them.

Knocking them out was quicker work than killing them, ands swiftly turned to aid Brasidas with the last of the Kolossi. Pouncing just as he dodged a spear blow, she drove her sword into its back, shattering it.

She looked and, finally, she could see Brasidas’ face. There was the exhilaration of battle that she knew, but where she might have expected joy, or at least satisfaction at another one of it won, there was a pained expression in his eyes; and he soon averted his gaze. Once again confused, and hurt, Kassandra turned away herself and to the unconscious guards behind her.

“Watch this,” she said, more light-hearted than she felt. One by one, she raised the Staff of Hermes and freed each of them from Hypnos’s control. “Go,” she told them, “make your way to Rebel’s Peak. Adonis will receive you there.” They nodded and, casting curious looks at Brasidas as they went, left the cave.

Once they were alone again, Kassandra waited, a lump in her throat made as much of impatience as of fear for her friend.

“That was impressive,” Brasidas eventually conceded, gesturing at the Staff. “Impressive.” He still could not look at her.

“What did you mean when you said, ’no tricks?’” she asked. “Why did you address Persephone, not me?”

“Because you cannot be real,” he answered, and he sounded so resigned. So weary. She had never known him this way, not even when the physicians told him it was a miracle he could hold a spear again. “The gods… they have sent you, an image. Persephone has sent you to punish me, for what I am about to do.”

“Brasidas, we fought, together. You see me as I stand before you, how can this not be real?”

( _But it isn’t_ , whispered a traitorous voice inside her.)

He shook his head.

“Were this anywhere else, I might mistake it for a dream,” he smiled sadly, “to see you again, as you were, a hero, and even more resplendent now.” He let his eyes take in her armour, but still not her face. “A dream, not a nightmare.”

Kassandra was truly frightened, now. What had Persephone _done_ to him? Anger rose inside her, too.

“Whatever Persephone has done to you, I _will_ unmake it,” she growled, promised, driving the Staff into the rock under their feet and setting the air to reverberate around them.

“She has not done anything to me, Eagle-Bearer,” he contradicted her. “Except perhaps to send me this spectre of my past.”

“No-one _sent_ me,” Kassandra threw her hand up now. “Except perhaps Leonidas,” she added more quietly.

“Leonidas betrayed me to Persephone?” Brasidas questioned.

“No, he betrayed you to his _granddaughter_ , who is your _friend_. And betrayed is a strong word,” she scolded him quite without meaning to, but his listlessness scared and irritated her, and she had to take it out on _someone_. “He sent me after you because he feared to you were in danger.” She declined to recall the exact words Leondas had used. She doubted Brasidas would appreciate it in his current state. “Brasidas, why do you want Lethe’s water? What ailment are you hoping to cure that could have followed you into death?”

“Do you truly care to know?”

“Yes!”

“The only sickness that lasts an eternity,” he answered, defeat in the slope of his shoulders. “It cannot kill you, not here, so instead it torments you.” Finally, Brasidas raised his gaze to hers. “A broken heart, Kassandra.”


	3. in lethe's lake they long oblivion taste

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Finally, Kassandra understood: Lethe, one of the rivers of Hades. It was said that, in order to forget their earthly lives, the souls of Hades had to drink from it so they could reincarnate. It was also named ‘oblivion.’ The Lethe bordered Elysium but did not flow through it — and if Brasidas believed Persephone wanted to punish him for wanting it, perhaps that was by design._
> 
> Kassandra understands what Brasidas means to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the feelins continue to moider me

Finally, Kassandra understood: Lethe, one of the rivers of Hades. It was said that, in order to forget their earthly lives, the souls of Hades had to drink from it so they could reincarnate. It was also named ‘oblivion.’ The Lethe bordered Elysium but did not flow through it — and if Brasidas believed Persephone wanted to punish him for wanting it, perhaps that was by design.

“You would forget _everything_?” she asked quietly. “All of it? All of your memories, who you were, what you did… what _we_ did.”

“You are not real,” he shook his head, and moved away from her. “I cannot let myself be swayed.”

“I _am_ real,” she protested. ( _Liar_.) “Why do you keep insisting I cannot be?”

“Because then you must be dead!” Brasidas suddenly cried, using his fists to beat upon his own chest in desperate agitation. “And that I could bear even less.” He looked at her now the way he used to, eyes filled with desperate belief — in her, in her worthiness, in her _coming home_. “Sparta needs you, Kassandra. I know it isn’t what you wish to hear, but its people do. The Greek _world_ needs you. You would deserve Elysium, would deserve _peace_ more than any other. But not yet. Not before your time.”

Struck dumb, Kassandra could only stare at him. Then, she felt the Staff’s impossible weight in her hand. Her time would not come ere long; and she doubted her spirit would find Elysium, if it still existed then.

“I am not dead, Brasidas.” Slowly, with measured movements, she returned the Staff to her back. “I am here, in Elysium. I _am_ here. I’m on a mission that concerns all of Sparta, and the world.” Carefully, she stepped closer, reaching out for him.

“So you are only passing through,” he said, that same sad smile again playing on his lips.

“Brasidas, you have felt my weight upon your shield countless times before. Did it not feel now as it did then?” She took another step closer, hope rising when he did not shy away. There was something in his eyes that _wanted_ to believe her. “Please,” she whispered.

As though a river spilling over, a ripple went through Brasidas from tip to toe, and within one long stride, he had clasped her hand, and pulled her in against his chest. Gratefully, she sunk into the embrace, one so familiar even for all the few they had shared, before and after battle. His shield arm wrapped around her back and that, too, was a feeling she knew, only ever fleetingly.

Safe.

“Come with me,” she murmured, swallowing when he tilted his head down so his forehead rested on the leather of her shoulder armour. “Come back to Rebel’s Peak with me, or even Minos’ Faith. We can talk about this. And if you still _need_ the water then, I will help you come back and retrieve it. I promise.”

She felt Brasidas nod against her.

“Good. Let’s go.”

* * *

They journeyed out of the cave together, leaving the promise of Lethe’s oblivion behind. For now.

Once they were outside, in the sun, shaking off the water, Kassandra finally got a good look at him. He seemed fully restored, no lingering, aching memory of that injury from his first meeting with Deimos. He was as strong as she had known him.

“Where to?” Brasidas asked.

Thinking about it now, Kassandra disliked the idea of being around a camp full of rebels; or Hermes’ workshop and nosy attitude.

“How about Leonidas’ homestead?” she suggested. “He has gone to join Adonis and the human rebels, so we won’t be disturbed.”

Brasidas weighed the notion a moment, and then nodded. He still looked tired.

“I can call my horse,” she said, and he passed her a grateful look. She whistled sharply, and Orphnaeus came trotting around the corner. Brasidas reared back.

“You _stole_ one of Hades’ horses?”

“Just borrowed him,” she shrugged. Brasidas sighed.

“Why is it always trouble with you?” Despite his defeated, long-suffering demeanour, there was some of that old amusement, an echo of his uproarious laughter that she would enjoy whenever she returned to the _agoge_ or one of the war camps and told him old stories from Kephallonia, or of her more recent exploits against the Cult and Sparta’s enemies.

It was this that emboldened her to say, with a smile, “Would you have it any other way?” as she mounted the patiently waiting horse, reaching down to give him a hand, knowing he was one of few Spartan men who would not see it as an indignity.

“No,” he said decisively, taking her hand and leveraging himself up behind her. “Not today.” His hands found her waist, the familiar touch of soldiers and travel companions, and she dug her heels into Orphnaeus’ flanks.

* * *

Arriving at the homestead of Leonidas, they went inside in search of food, and wine, Kassandra hazarded as she grabbed the pitcher from the table; and took it all outside to sit on the bench.

How many evenings had they spent like this while waiting for Kleon’s troops to land, and before?

They ate first, and drank, all while barely speaking. They had never needed to fill the silences.

It was at length that Kassandra began.

“Why do you want to drink from the Lethe?”

“I told you why,” said Brasidas, but it was not a rebuke for it was too softly spoken. “Grief is enough to fell any man while he lives, but here, where we are dead and yet undying… it fills your heart until one day there is room for nothing else. It becomes all you know. You are sick and your skin feels too small. And you cannot escape,” he raised his hand in a wide, sweeping arc. “This is all you have, and its beauty brings you only misery, for the one you would share it with is not here. Is never here.”

Regarding his profile, Kassandra recognised the hurt etched into the lines around his eyes, lines that she would have watched crease with his smiles so long ago, and the tightness of his mouth. Here was a man deeply in pain, more so in death than he had ever been in life. Good, strong Brasidas; and even he was weak to this most insidious of Death’s machinations.

“Leonidas said that those who drink from the Lethe’s waters suffer a broken heart, disappointed hopes. Regret.” She cast about for the right words, blind as a fisherman at dawn. “Brasidas, you were never—you never married. I never heard you speak of anyone… is it that you regret?”

Had there been someone? All that time, and he had never said a word, about anyone. Had there been a man or woman in Sparta, or had he loved one of his soldiers? Had they loved him, were mourning him now, and Kassandra never knew? Had she walked past them, callously, not knowing she could have brought comfort to someone who had not shared in Brasidas’ final moments, or perhaps they had?

She barely saw him nod.

The sting of it was sharp enough, but dulled by time and the Fates intervening once again. Once, perhaps, she might have thought—might have hoped…

“They must have captured your heart quite firmly if you are going to such lengths to forget them,” she said softly. Could she help him? To forget all he was, had been… it seemed so wrong. Blasphemous. But more than anything, she did not want him to suffer.

He looked at her, then, pain returned to his eyes.

“That is precisely why I have no choice,” he rasped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kassandra, oblivious: Wow you must really love this person.  
> Brasidas, screaming internally: Haha yeah I guess.


	4. of future life secure, forgetful of the past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _As all the food they had brought out was gone, they continued with more wine. It was something to do, and of course the wine in Elysium only tasted of the finest grapes in Greece._   
>  _It was Brasidas who broke the silence next._
> 
> Foolish hearts can be mended.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> /cries

As all the food they had brought out was gone, they continued with more wine. It was something to do, and of course the wine in Elysium only tasted of the finest grapes in Greece. It was Brasidas who broke the silence next.

“What kind of a mission?” he asked. Kassandra had wondered when he would.

“I have been sent here by one of the Isu, the ones we called the First Civilisation. They are enough like gods to deserve our wrath for all their meddling, but there is one of them who wants to help humanity. Her name is Aletheia.”

“ _Sent_ to Elysium? Into the realm the living are not welcome?”

“Persephone has welcomed me,” Kassandra told him _somewhat_ smugly. “First, she tried to have me killed, and then she asked my name.”

Brasidas looked uncannily as though he were holding in another sigh.

“And now you’re helping Adonis?”

Kassandra shrugged. “I was bound to do something to make Persephone cross with me sooner or later.”

“Sooner rather than later,” Brasidas teased her, but he quickly sobered. “How will you be able to leave? Persephone will not permit you to open the gate to Hades.”

“Not unless I force her hand,” Kassandra agreed.

Brasidas sent her a measuring sort of look. “You’re weakening her control over each of the four regions.”

Kassandra subtly tipped her chin.

He huffed, and shook his head, looking back out over Elysium. Those fields had never seen blood run from a thousand gaping wounds, red surging into soil and sand and staining it forever.

“Trust Kassandra the Eagle-Bearer to bend the realm of the gods to her will,” he declared. “As she does everything else,” he added so quietly she almost did not catch it. Before she could ask what he meant, he stood from the bench and paced a few feet away, towards the cliff’s edge. With his shield gone, she saw the tense line of his shoulders. Something else was gnawing at him, she could tell.

“Would you help us?” she asked, and stood as well to join him. “Me, and Adonis.”

“Adonis can take one of those Wings of Hermes and go up to Olympus and stay there with his beloved Aphrodite, for all I care,” said Brasidas. Kassandra was about to ask whether that was a No, when he half turned towards her and continued, “But I would help _you_ conquer the world. And the Underworld, too.”

Her heart skipped in her chest, but she restrained her smile.

“Thank you.”

He nodded. Kassandra thought he might turn back, but instead his gaze lingered on her face.

“That’s it about you,” he murmured. “You’re only ever passing through, yet those of us who stay behind would do anything to be visited by your grace.” He spoke with such reverence, such earnest regard. The same way he had looked at her ever since learning her name.

Now, Kassandra could scarcely hide her blush. Her gaze slid away from Brasidas’ and found his shield and her Staff, leaning side by side against the wall of the house. She turned back to him.

“Brasidas, I—”

Whatever she would have said next, the world would have already forgotten, as the words were stolen from her by Brasidas’ lips on hers. A firm press, a soft brush of his beard, and he was gone again. She thought he might withdraw, but he stayed, holding her gaze. His eyes were filled with sorrow.

“You spoke of regret. Perhaps now there can be less of that.”

Kassandra found herself reeling — was he…?

“Brasidas,” she questioned, half annoyed at how reedy her voice sounded, her air caught in her throat.

“I never told you. I watched you under every star and the sun in the sky, and loved you every day and night of it; and I was fool enough to hope there might be time. To hope that _you_ might… I’m sorry,” he croaked, and now he did turn away in shame. “I should not have done that.”

He… he _loved_ her?

“It’s me you need so badly to forget?” And she could not help the tears welling up in her eyes. “It’s me who… who brings you so much pain?”

In an instant, Brasidas was returned to her side, his fingertips hovering above her cheek, not quite daring to touch.

“You brought me joy every day that I knew you while I found myself alive,” he vowed. “This pain is not of your making, Kassandra of Sparta. Beloved Eagle-Bearer. It is merely my foolish heart.” At his admission, a tear spilled over and he wiped it away, gently, with the pad of his thumb. “I cannot fathom forgetting you,” he whispered, “but I know I must.”

“How do you know?” she whispered back, and set her hands upon his cheeks in return, to draw him closer. “What does your heart know of mine? Hmm?” She closed the distance between them, until they were almost chest to chest.

( _Liar_. There was that voice again, and she nearly faltered. Hadn’t she believed, mere hours ago, that nothing she did here truly mattered. Was it wise, then, to do this? Was this merely what she wished, come true? Was it a _gift_ from Aletheia, who had surely looked into her heart, to find the missing fragments? Was this part of the Keeper’s duty?)

She forged on, despite herself. “Can’t one be mended by another?”

“Kassandra,” he rasped, his breath whispering against hers. “I can’t…”

“My heart was foolish, too,” she confessed, a secret she had buried so, so deep after Amphipolis. “I just _assumed_ there would be time, as if it wasn’t the whirlwind of my own life that brought into battle alongside me in the first place. Brasidas, my heart broke the day you died, and i have been living with that knowledge ever since.” Her throat was tight now with tears unshed. “Please don’t drink from the Lethe. Please don’t send me back out of Elysium knowing that you cannot remember me. Please.”

Without another word, Brasidas sealed her mouth with his.

High above the Fields of Elysium, they kissed until the sun never set.

* * *

Returned to the bench, Kassandra leaned into Brasidas’ chest, his arm around her waist, and her smile widening every time he bent his head to drop a kiss into her hair.

“Where will you go next?”

“Hekate summoned me. Another errand, I expect.” She turned her head to press her lips against the skin of his bicep peeking out between the pieces of his armour.

“And then, you will overthrow the Queen of the Underworld,” he said with teasing admiration. “You know I can’t come with you,” he added more quietly. “I would, forever. You know that, too.”

Kassandra’s heart clenched at how little he knew how right he truly was.

“I know,” she answered, lacing their fingers together. “But what if I could return? If I could persuade—” she stopped herself just in time. “If I could persuade Hades?”

Brasidas barked a laugh. “Ha!” He leaned closer, curving around her, and kissed her. “My mighty Eagle-Bearer,” he rumbled, love in his eyes. “If anyone could barter with the gods and win, it’s you.”

Kassandra bit her lip, and laid her cheek against his jaw.

She would damn well try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who left kudos and comments! All my five million feelings for this ship just exploded, and I had to see this done.


End file.
